James 5:16 says, “The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working,’ and 1 Thessalonians 5:17 says, “pray without ceasing.”
Obviously, prayer is important. Jesus prayed. So did the apostles. And the Bible calls us to pray.
But prayer can be hard. Sometimes, I feel like my prayers should be longer, or I should have more to say, or I should pray more often.
But what God wants from us is simply to pray and set our thoughts on Him in every situation—because He is (and should be) deeply involved in everything we face.
That being said, I think that it’s good to set aside time to pray on a regular basis—even if it’s just for a minute or two. I like to pray after reading my Bible every morning and before I go to bed every night.
And sometimes, I use tools to help me pray. I want to share those tools with you today.
Here are four tools that help my prayer life.
1. Praying through the Bible.
You’ll never run out of things to pray about when you pray through the Bible! It’s amazing, because you get to hear from God and talk to God at the same time.
Pray about the things you read in God’s Word. For example, if you read 1 Corinthians 13:4 where it says, “Love is patient, love is kind,” you could pray, “You are patient and kind, Jesus. Please help me to be patient and kind like You.”
Maybe you could pray about instances where you have had trouble being patient and kind. You could pray for someone else you know who is patient and kind, or someone struggling to show those traits.
2. Asking for prayer requests.
It’s important to pray for other people. If our prayers have power, then our prayers for others make an impact. We should use our words to bless others, and prayer is a way to do that.
It’s good to pray for other people even when they don’t ask us to, but we are often able to pray about more specific things and reminded to pray more if we ask for prayer requests.
Sometimes, people are struggling with things that we may not know about unless we ask them. If I was struggling with honoring my parents, I probably wouldn’t approach someone and say, “Can you pray that I will be able to honor my parents?” But if someone asked me for a prayer request, I might bring up that battle.
When people ask you to pray about something, it makes prayers so much more personal. It also helps with empathy because you know the struggles of the people you interact with and you long for them to overcome those struggles.
3. Writing prayers down.
I can get my thoughts out more clearly when I write them down. Whenever I’m feeling a lot of emotions, my thoughts are jumbled, and my feelings or thoughts need to be expressed, I write a prayer on a piece of paper.
This helps me sort out my thoughts—and I also love looking back on the prayers later. Often, I was struggling with a certain thing when I prayed, and reading the prayer encourages me, especially if I have overcome that thing.
I also keep two prayer journals that help me to pray for others. I picked two people that I want to consistently pray for, and I write down my prayers for them in separate prayer journals. I am going to keep writing prayers for them until the journals are filled.
4. Spinning a prayer wheel.
I have an app on my phone called Tiny Decisions. It has a wheel that I can customize and spin on it, so I write down the names of people I want to pray for on the wheel. I spin the wheel three times every night before I go to bed, and I pray for the three people it lands on.
It’s a great way to get me to pray for other people—often, people I wouldn’t have thought of otherwise. .
Those are four things that help me to pray. Do you have any tips that help you pray?